Friday, May 1, 2009

There has been much talk about who well own Chrysler in the near future.

There is much talk about the fact that the United States government will take an owner stake in the company, but form reports I've seen the government will only own 8% of the company.

and of course there is the news of the merger with Italian car company Fiat, but Fiat will only start of owning 20% and maybe able to own 35% in the future if certain things happen.

What I find the most interesting are the new would be owners that you don't see covered in the media.

first the United States isn't the only government that is going to own Chrysler, Canada will also own 2% of the car company. Not as much as the US true, but it makes since giving that the American car industry is also big part of Canada's economy as it is ours.

But what I find really interesting is the fact that the UAW will own 55% of the company. That's right the United Auto Workers union well now be majority owner of Chrysler, well to be more correct the union's retiree health care trust fund well be the owners. With this news I am wondering how close the new Chrysler will be to a worker cooperative. they have the majority ownership, but I don't know if the union will have the most control of the company.

and another question is, would it be a bad thing if the union took control of the company? The people in the union have a vested interest in making sure the company stays afloat for not only the short term but the long term as well as since this is there livelihood. Also the fact that the union is made up of average blue collar people they have a better feel what average American wants, then the past owners of the company.

the later is very important giving that I live in Michigan and have gone past the parking lot of car factories and noticed that some people had non-American cars. Maybe if those workers had a bigger voice in the company they could have gotten Chrysler to produce cars with the features they wanted and giving how bad the company has been doing, they may have been able to bring out more cars that people wanted.